Are Private Conversations Private?...NOT Always

Tyreek Hill
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Turns out the NFL has a new player scandal, this one involving Tyreek Hill, a receiver for the Kansas City Chiefs.

Earlier Thursday evening, KCTV in Kansas City aired part of an 11-minute audio file in which Crystal Espinal (Hill's fiancee) tells Hill that when asked about an injury to the child's arm, the boy replied: "Daddy did it.''

"Hill denies any role in what happened to the child's arm, adding: "He says Daddy does a lot of things."

"Espinal then says, "A 3-year-old is not going to lie about what happened to his arm.''

"Daddy did it," Espinal says, paraphrasing the boy. "He is terrified of you."

"Hill responds, according to the recording: "You need to be terrified of me, too, b----."

"Later in the recording, Espinal says, "He kept saying 'Daddy punches me,' which you do when he starts crying. What do you do? You make him open up his arms, and you punch him in the chest. Then if he gets in trouble, you get the belt out.''

"The conversation was recorded as the couple walked through Dubai International Airport, according to KCTV. No date for the conversation was given.

"The portion of the recording played on KCTV on Thursday starts with Espinal saying, "We were getting into it, and he said, 'Daddy, you're mean.' So we walked up the stairs. You said, 'Come back down here,' and he didn't want to go down there. But I was like, 'Go down there because it will end up worse for you.' So he walked down there and then you were getting on his [deleted]. ... Then he started crying, and you were like, 'Shut up, shut up, stop crying. Shut up, shut up, stop crying.'"

"Hill replies, "Right.'' (http://www.espn.com/…/hill-barred-chiefs-activities-wake-au…)

My wife made an interesting point, "Who hasn't uttered angry, off color, regrettable things in private, especially at home." She considers recording such private statements for public consumption and personal gain, "the greatest violation of trust."

That was her response to the recent Tyreek Hill comments, as it was to when V. Stiviano surreptitiously recorded Donald Sterling.

The fact is that such private utterances aren't really protected.

Often such publicized private utterances hurt people, as with Alex Baldwin's released answering machine message to his daughter (used against him in divorce proceedings) and sometimes they don't, as in the case of former Clippers owner, Donald Sterling.

Except for the public embarrassment, Donald Sterling wasn't harmed at all by his regrettable comments to V. Stiviano, as Sterling had bought the then (1981) struggling San Diego Clippers for $12.5 million and when pressured to sell, the Sterling's sold the Clippers to Steve Balmer for $2 BILLION!

Good for the Sterling's. They did good business. Live and be well.

On top of all that, Donald Sterling's family sued his mistress, V. Stiviano and courts ruled that V. Stiviano had to return $2.6 million in gifts (a Condo, cars, etc) to the Sterling's.

As of now, Tyreek Hill has been suspended from all football activities with the Chiefs. It remains to be seen whether this ends his NFL career, or not. He seems to be a potentially dangerously unstable man.

While I agree with my wife about the recording and publicizing such utterances as a violation of trust, the law doesn't really protect such utterances as "privileged."
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